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Observation 1: Sunspots Location: Home Clear skies with occasional clouds, light wind. Three areas of activity were seen. 1- Near the equator had what appeared to be two spots - one circular and the other oblong with a slight curve. NOTE: A photo in spaceweeather.com showed AR2677 and AR 2678. Not sure which of these two was seen. |
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Observation 2:
Constellations: Boötes
Planet: Uranus
Stars: Alkalurops (μ1 & μ2), HD135631, HR5673
Messier Objects: M23 (NGC 6494), M45 (Pleiades)
Moon: Waning Gibbous (92.1%)
Located, Not Observed: M8, M20, M21
Location: Wharf Road in East Noel, NS
Date: 2017-09-08
Time: 9:40 PM - 11:00 PM ADT
Instrument: Visual + Binoculars (10x30 IS)
Transparency: Good (3)
Seeing: Good (3)
Temperature: 16º C - 14º C
Very light breeze. Clear skies. Light pollution in the low horizon across the bay. The Moon also washed out some of the stars. There were clouds travelling over the Moon that did provide some "darkness" and allowed for viewing.
| Uranus Time: not recorded Instrument: Visual + Binoculars (10x30 IS) Noticed a bright spot at about 10 o'clock to the Moon and a good distance away from it. Binoculars showed a blue, non-blinking object. SkySafariPro confirmed it was Uranus in Pisces. |
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M23 / NGC 6494 For details, refer to Messier Catalogue - M023 (NGC 6494) - September 8, 2017. |
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Boötes Boötes was in the opposite side of the sky from the Moon. I found Arcturus then located δ Boötes and Neckar (β). Thought I visually could see the bright location of the double, but turned out it was actually HD135631 and HR5673 very close together in a vertical line. I then adjusted where I should be looking - a little further away from the imaginary line between α and β and closer to the δ end of the line. Success! |
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M45 (Pleiades) Even though the Moon was quite bright, the main stars could still be seen - Asterope, Sterope, Tyageta, Electra, Maia, Merope, Alcyone, Pleione and Atlas. The star field and nebulosity behind and around them was not visible with the binoculars. |